I would like to raise awreness to the fact that advertising in its current
form (I beleive) is a method of social control. Advertising per say is not
that harmful when the advertising is about the product directly, however
there is not much of this about. If you refer to my original post (HELP -
consumerism, homogonisation etc.) then you may understand what I am on
about. With the values placed on materialistic aquisition as it is at
present, advertisng becomes an important tool. This tool is what creates
demand for things like calvin klein underpants nad nike t-shirts. The
blatant lies that help to reinforce advertising are anything but productive.
But first you must address the issues that give rise to such practices,
and this can lay blame firmly on the shoulders of consumerism. First
remember that advertising takes many different forms, not just the blatant
advertising we see in magazines, billboards and televison, but also
advertising that comes when a product is associated with a particular social
value, such as famous people endorsing products and the apparent benefits
that arise from the use of a particular product. Take oat bran for example
(the book tainted truth will open your eyes - sorry I cant recall the
author) oat bran was found to reduce cholesterol levels by up to 10% if you
believe quaker oats' advertising. quaker oats made a huge increse in sales
because of this. The scientific study that supported this claim was funded
by quaker oats. The study showed that oats had an ability to reduce
cholesterol by an average of 6% when combined with a low cholesterol diet
(10% was the best result). The study was also fundamentally flawed. Double
blind testing was not used and oats were consumed with various different
ingredients. The amount of oats consumed was also very high compared to
what an average person would consume, and this massive consumption was shown
to have detrimental effects on other bodily functions, such as bowel
movement. A while later other scientists were studying something completely
different (excuse my ignorance I cannot recall the nuances) and failed thier
hypothosis, however they proved that oats had a negligable effect on
cholesterol levels, this time the results could be quantified far better
than the original study - quaker oats lost a lot of sales and even took the
second studies scientists to court - the scientists won. This illustrates
the terrible situation that is occuring today in scientific study. As
governments and universities no longer have enough funds to pay for these
studies, the scientists must seek corporate help. The amounts of money that
these companies provide are reasonably large, and contracts usually include
clauses that must show thir product in a favourable light, or the funding
will be withheld. This was also the case in the disposable vs cotton nappy
debates. What happens is that scientists will find any little thing that
shows a product is "good" and this is what gets released to the media,
regardless of a bunch of other facts that show negative aspects of the same
product. Its all about creating money. A study in the US on what high
school students prefered to wear showed that 8\10 students prefered to wear
Levis 501's. The questionaire that was used had only Levi 501's, not jeans.
This makes the study a bit rediculous as these students may not have liked
501's as much as say Lee jeans or any other brand of jeans for that matter,
however as 501's were their only option as to their preference in wearing
denim pants then they chose the 501's.
The internet IPO phenomenon is linked to the same thing, generation of hype
through marketing. I made my old man a fair bit of money from this and
pulled the plug about 8 weeks before the meltdown. It doesnt require that
much knowledge, just the understanding that advertising effects the masses
in such a way that truth/facts are ignored whilst something is considered
trendy, creating artificial demand. To be able to see this through the
illusion of advertising is the hard thing for most people. This adverising
creates artificial demand based on our desire to fit in, why else would you
pay $40 for a tshirt that is identical with the exception of a swoosh to a
shirt you could buy for $10. Advertising of this sort stifles consumer
choice as smaller firms simply cannot compete. when we are exposed to
something enough we become comfortable with it, comfort is considered good
and as such people seek it. I would argue that if I invented a brand, which
simply took nike products and rebranded them as something different, sold
them for identical prices and offered the same quality control measures, but
didnt advertise it, then people would still choose the nike product. we
quite simply dont like to be that different, and when we see all sorts of
images portraying a particular product, then we wont feel so different.
If people were not so blinded by this mass of advertising we would choose
products that best served our need. These products dont need much
advertising at all - or shouldnt - as they are full of quality, which is
what we desire, as illustrated by Mr Pirsig. However advertising has
created a pseudo quality that the masses have trouble differentiating from
the real thing, and this has come about to keep the big guys on top and the
rest of us subordinate. Imagine if suddenly people started choosing the
product that gave them the most utility. I dont think Mr Knight would be
too pleased.
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